BREMF 2026 – PREVIEW

The Brighton Early Music Festival 2026 has the theme of Bringers of Dreams and it has already started weaving its charms with the Polyphony Crawl. This month there are still some Workshops to come and an Open Mic evening for those devotees who want to get involved, but the season starts formally on 2 October with CITY OF DREAMS, in St George’s Church. This promises a dramatic evocation of the musical life of Florence during the Renaissance and Early Baroque. In classic BREMF style it involves top-rate professional musicians alongside the expert BREMF Consort of Voices and a clutch of Brighton Primary School Pupils, who, if anything like last year, will bring their own level of fascination, rapt attention and charm. They are sure to be fully-fledged young experts by the time of the performance.

BREMF – OAE TOTS

Their interest may actually have started a few years ago if they were lucky enough to attend any OAE TOTS, this year at the Brighton Unitarian Church. On Saturday morning 3 October tales of Don Quichotte will be told through music by musicians of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, whose day job is usually accompanying Baroque operas at Glyndebourne. Under 12s get in for free!

That evening sees the ever-curious Spiritato! return to BREMF with an astronomical programme of Baroque delicacies and surprises (if their previous form is anything to go by!) which in St Martin’s Church.

BREMF – Spiritato!

On the afternoon of Sunday 4 October, St Augustine’s Arts & Events Centre will host the daring DREAM LAB. This could be very risky as three embryonic early music projects will be tried out on what is sure to be a very discerning BREMF audience. Never shy of offering informed and supportive comment, BREMF connoisseurs know what they like and will be eager to encourage excellence. It should be a very fruitful event and we may look forward to hearing the resulting enriched concerts sometime.

BREMF – The Fairy Queen

Weekend 2 starts majestically on Friday 9 October with London Handel Players giving Purcell’s ever popular THE FAIRY QUEEN in St George’s Church, with a talented company of young artists and BREMF stalwarts, directed by Adrian Butterfield.

Bremf Emerging Artists

Another array of Bremf Emerging Artists appear the following afternoon in St Paul’s Church and again in the evening at the BREMF CLUBNIGHT scrunched into The Rose Hill pub. These young performers get more than just a gig and expenses because the BREMF Emerging Artists scheme includes invaluable mentoring, the all that practical advice that performance tuition overlooks. We have been very lucky to enjoy the careers of so many BREMF alumni as they develop and return as well established international stars.

BREMF – Artemis Consort

Artemis Consort is presenting POLIA’S POWER on Sunday 11 October in St Paul’s Church. It explores “longing, agency and the female voice within a richly imagined dreamscape”, which promises a selection of unfamiliar Renaissance music with video projection. BREMF has a splendid track record of finding excellent Euro ensembles. We are always keen to discover any new area of Early music.

BREMF – The Fine Hand

Similarly, on Friday 16 October, The Fine Hand, a mainly US ensemble performing in Europe, will relate medieval European song with Appalachian ballads in their programme SEND IT BY WATER in St George’s Church. They are holding an explanatory workshop the day before at Fabrica, which also hosts Kadir Karababa’s audio-visual installation ONE SONG.

BREMF – Kieran White

Saturday 17 October is a full day commemorating the 400 years since the great John Dowland died. With DRAW ON, SWEET NIGHT super tenor Kieran White returns again, now accompanied by lutenist Daniel Murphy and no less than the five viols of The Republic of Viols, to sing Dowland songs in context with works by Campion, Charpentier and (new to me) Moulinié. Later that afternoon, also in St Nicholas’ Church, Dowland’s Foundry will perform excerpts from his last book of songs, A Pilgrim’s Solace (1612), and the world premiere of Brighton composer Barry Mills ‘Night’. Dowland Day concludes in Fabrica with the exquisite soprano Ruby Hughes and lutenist Jonas Nordberg performing Dowland songs along with the music of Robert Johnson, Henry Purcell and the Master of the King’s Music Errollyn Wallen.

The third weekend of BREMF ends back in St Nicholas’ Church with music by Dufay and the polymath Henri Arnaut de Zwolle performed by the Amsterdam based recorder trio Ymnus.

BREMF Community Choir

Week 4 starts (Friday 23 October) with the infectious enthusiasm of the BREMF Community Choir, this year harking all the way back to the death of St Francis of Assisi, 800 years ago. St Paul’s Church is likely to be filled to bursting again! … and again on Saturday lunchtime when another poly-Euro trio Nocturnalia return to give the Malcolm Rose Concert, expounding on Tartini’s ‘Devil’s Trill’ Sonata.

BREMF – Nocturnalia

On Saturday evening St Martin’s Church hosts the Deborah Roberts Concert. Utopia Ensemble will perform works by Lassus, Isaac and Clemens non Papa, with readings by Philipp Blom, who will join the audience in public discussion in Fabrica the following morning, coffee & cake included!

BREMF – Utopia Ensemble

The final event of BREMF 2026 is the SONGPATH WALK in Stanmer Park. Some BREMF events might seem arcane, highly specialist and exclusive but the BREMF tribe is open to all; there are events for every taste, and everyone can expect a warm welcome at the concerts, workshops and fun events. Over the years the BREMF Community has grown enormously and developed its scope, its performing skills and its appreciation of all kinds of Early Music as it continues to fulfil the dream of the BREMF founder, Deborah Roberts.

Andrew Connal
September 2026